


i love you (more than i could ever let you know)

by FeatheryMinx



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, F/M, Gen, Post-Endgame, Supportive mom, good family relationships, morgan uses numbers and math to connect her dad, numbers & math
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-27
Updated: 2019-09-30
Packaged: 2020-02-07 06:58:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18615490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FeatheryMinx/pseuds/FeatheryMinx
Summary: ENDGAME SPOILERS!!!!After Tony's death, Morgan figures out how to connect to him.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This lowkey won't really have a plot, it's just kind of me taking the "I love you 3000" thing and spinning it.

_“I love you three thousand.”_

_“Wow… three thousand…” Tony kissed her forehead, then got up to leave the room. At the door, he turned back to her and said, “Go to sleep, or I’ll sell all your toys.”_

_She giggled, and the door shut softly._  

* * *

 The last few visitors didn’t leave the house until a week after the funeral. May and Peter had been reluctant to go home, because that meant leaving Pepper and Morgan by themselves, but in the end it was Pepper who (gently) pushed them out the door, asking Happy to take them back to the city. As the sun set, Pepper sat with Morgan on the porch and watched the car drive out of sight. When it was no longer visible, when the last vestiges of sunlight faded, she kissed Morgan’s forehead. Morgan let out a small sigh. “Come on sweetheart, let’s get you to bed.” When Morgan didn’t respond, Pepper smiled. ‘ _She’s half asleep already.’_

After Pepper tucked Morgan in, she went to her own room. She got into her bed, pulled up the covers, and then willed herself to fall asleep in spite of how empty ~~too empty~~ the large bed remained.

When Pepper awoke, it was to a little figure trying to crawl under the covers with her. Pepper sat up and turned on the lamp next to her. “Honey, why are you awake?” Morgan simply shrugged. “Morgan.”

“I miss daddy.”

“Oh, sweetheart.” Pepper pulled Morgan into her lap. “I miss daddy too.”

The two of them sat together for a few moments, then Pepper said, “You wanna go outside for a bit?” Morgan nodded, and so they walked outside, past the porch, past the driveway, down to where Tony lay buried. They sat down in front of his grave, and Morgan whispered, “I want you back.”

Pepper winced, then, as softly as she could, said to her, “You know he can’t come back.” Morgan just nodded, her face buried in Peppers side. After a second, Morgan looked back up, reached over to touch the cool stone, and said, “I love you ten thousand.”

At that, Pepper started crying. Morgan noticed the tears and quickly stated, “I love you ten thousand too, mommy.” Pepper let out a watery laugh and swiped the tears away.

“I love you ten thousand too, honey.” After a pause, Pepper continued, “Ten thousand, though. That’s a big number. When’d you learn it?”

“I was playing with Peter and he taught me! Well, he didn’t really teach me but I know it from playing with him.”

“That’s amazing, sweetheart.” Pepper stood up, lifting Morgan with her. They began to make their way back inside, Pepper continuing to ask Morgan questions about what she did with Peter. Even as she talked to Morgan, a thought kept coming to her.

_‘The world moves on, whether you’re ready or not.’_


	2. Chapter 2

When she was in 3th grade, Morgan came home and called, “Mommy! Mommy!”

“I’m down here!”

Morgan ran as fast as her legs would take her, down to the grave by the lake. “Mommy, did you know a million? A girl in my class told me about it! It’s way bigger than a thousand! It’s a thousand thousands!” Morgan paused, and Pepper chuckled.

“I guess I love you a million?”

Morgan nodded vigorously, then turned to Tony’s grave and said, still slightly out of breath, “I love you a million.”

* * *

At 12, Morgan was beginning to grow up. One summer night, as Pepper was leaving her room, Morgan said “Love you a billion.”

“Oh? We’ve upgraded to a billion now?”

Morgan suddenly seemed unsure of what she’d said. “I can go back to a million if you want, but I don’t know, I just thought since a billion is basically a million but way bigger, it’d be better?”

Pepper walked back over to Morgan’s bed to drop a kiss on her forehead. “It’s not mine, honey; you choose anything you want. I love you a billion.”

Morgan grinned, and repeated, “I love you a billion.” Pepper made to leave the room again, but just as she was about to close the door, a question popped into Morgan’s head.

“Mom?”

“Yes?”

“Why do we do this number thing? We’ve done it for as long as I remember, and I know no one else says I love you with a number. They just say I love you. I’ve accidentally said this to some of my friends, and they’ve all looked at me like I was, not crazy, but like, weird. So, why do we even do it?”

Pepper inhaled sharply. “I’ll tell you in the morning.” Morgan stared at her, confused. It was a simple enough question, wasn’t it? But Pepper repeated “In the morning.” with such a sense of finality that Morgan knew she wouldn’t budge. She nodded, content to leave it until the morning.

\--

When the sunlight streamed in through the open shutters of her window, Morgan knew she could get up. She sped through her morning routine and bounced downstairs, ready to extract her desired answers from her mother. Pepper, in the middle of eating breakfast, simply pointed her fork to the plate across from her. Morgan took that for what it was, a cue to calm down, and she ate her breakfast slowly. Pepper left the room just as Morgan was finishing her food, and by the time she’d rinsed off her plate and put it away, Pepper was calling for her from the living room.

Pepper made a sweeping gesture towards the sofa. “Sit.” Morgan sat down on the sofa, and as she did so, she noticed the helmet her mother was fiddling with.

“Your memory probably faded, since you were 4-- ”

“Mom.”

“--when you last saw this, but I would have thought--”

Morgan spoke a little louder. “Mom. Is that-” Her voice cracked a little, and she tried again. “What does that have anything to do with-” Just then, a projection popped up.

“There we go. Just watch.” With that, Pepper set the helmet down on the coffee table in front of the sofa, and came to sit with Morgan.

As the projected video began, Morgan had to stifle a gasp. Her father was up there, speaking to  ~~them~~ her. Completely enraptured, she couldn’t move her eyes away from the projection, though she could feel that her mother was watching her instead of the video. At his final words, _I love you three thousand_ , the projection cut out, and Morgan shifted to face Pepper. However, before she could say anything, Pepper began to speak with a shaky voice.

“We talk about your father so much, but somehow I guess I’ve never told you this story. When you were younger, you started the numbers. You started at ‘I love you three’, actually, as a step up from ‘I love you too’, and then you just kept going. I think you were 3 when you changed it from counting up to just choosing the largest number you knew, and going with it.

You know when this video was recorded, and you know why it was recorded. But the “I love you 3000”? That came from the day before everything happened. You were four, and that night, when he put you to sleep, you told him “I love you 3000”. And he was so, so, so proud of that. He came back down and the first thing he said, before even telling me about how he’d figured out a way to make the Avengers’ plan work, was that you said that to him.”

Pepper paused, then laughed sadly. “You were in the low 600s the week before, actually, but you just jumped. And Tony, with all his degrees and with everything he’s done, was prouder in that moment than I’ve ever seen him before. You loved him 3000, you chose the largest number you could think of to tell him that you loved him with all of your heart. And he told you he loved you just the same way.”

Morgan sniffled, then launched herself so she could hug Pepper. “I love you mom.” Pepper didn’t question the omission of a number.

And if a few hours later, she saw Morgan go down to Tony’s grave and mouth “I love you a billion”, she didn’t question that either.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HI! I'm so sorry this chapter took so long (I say, as if this fic interests anyone). The plan was originally to have it all finished like, a week after the movie released, but stuff happened, life sucks, and I kind of lost all motivation. I never meant for this work to be abandoned though, so here we are!   
> The writing in this chapter is maybe a little rusty/boring, but I haven't written in months, so this is the best I can do.   
> The next (and final) chapter won't take super long; I'm writing it as soon as I post Chapter 3:)

When she was 16, Morgan began taking Calculus. Three weeks in, they started learning about limits. 

“Morgan?”

“I’m fine, Alex.” Morgan turned slightly to smile at her best friend, subtly blinking away the wetness in her eyes. Then, she opened her textbook and started solving every problem from the limits section. 

“Morgan, you know he hasn’t actually given us the homework yet, right? You’re probably doing problems that are unnecessary.”

“I know.” 

“Then why-”

“It’s… important.” And with that, Morgan turned her focus back to her textbook.

\-- 

When she got home that day, Morgan beelined for the grand wooden desk in her room. She opened up the bottommost drawer and pulled out an envelope and a clean sheet of paper. Slowly, painstakingly, Morgan combed through all the problems she’d completed earlier that day, and copied certain ones down onto the new paper. After she was done, she folded the paper neatly into thirds, placed it in the envelope, and then sealed the envelope. 

Satisfied, she rose, envelope in hand, when she heard the front door open. She walked down the stairs to see her mother putting away her coat. Morgan kissed Pepper on the cheek, reached past her to grab her own coat, and said, “I’m headed down to the lake, I’ll be back soon!” 

Morgan walked down to the lake and stopped in front of Tony’s grave. She knelt and carefully propped the envelope against the headstone. She sat in silence for another moment before she began speaking. 

“I love you with all of my heart. You know that, I know you do, wherever you are. But I could never say ‘I love you infinity’. Infinity just isn’t real enough. It doesn’t properly exist, and I refused to let myself use that cheap idea to describe you.” She took a deep breath, then continued. “Limits were… the answer to that. Infinity still isn’t real. But something that grows as it continues? That’s real. I love you boundlessly, and as time goes on, I love you more and more. I miss you, all the time, and I love you, even more so.” 

Morgan swiped at her eyes, then touched the envelope again. “Keep my love close, dad.”

* * *

Morgan was 17, and she was very determined to finish her project, even if meant being late for dinner. Suddenly, a shadow was cast over her. “Hey Morgs, whatcha up to? And do you think it could spare you long enough for you to eat?”

Without turning back, Morgan patted the ground beside her, prompting Peter to sit down cross-legged next to her. As he did, he noticed what he hadn’t before: over half a dozen half-formed bouquets were scattered around Morgan, and she was deftly plucking flowers out of the different bouquets to organize in… was that a paper base?

 “Morgs, what on earth are you doing with those flowers? Custom arrangements do exist, you know.”

“I wanted to do it myself.”

“Mhm. And what, exactly, is ‘it’?”

Instead of answering the question, Morgan inspected the arrangement in her hands. Seemingly unsatisfied, she grabbed a pair of scissors and cut a portion of the paper down its middle. Then she looked up, into Peter’s eyes. “If you cut a Mobius strip down the middle, it just twists itself. Cut it again, and it’ll form two distinct but connected Mobius strips. Again, and then you have 4. For as long as you cut it, a Mobius strip and all its thinner descendants will stay connected together.”

Understanding dawned in Peter’s eyes. “The base. You cut a Mobius strip to hold your arrangement.” Morgan nodded. “But I still don’t get what you’re making with it.”

Morgan reached for another flower, then told him. Peter looked at her, then chuckled. “Guess I’ll be late for dinner too. How can I help?”

“Hand me a red flower, please.”

\--

Twenty minutes later, as the sun was beginning to set, Pepper walked out to where the duo was sitting, and she sighed. “Peter, I sent you out here to get Morgan for dinner, not to miss dinner yourself. What am I going to do with the both of you?”

“Just a minute, Pepper.” At the same time, Morgan said, “Nearly done, mom.”

“Done with what?” Pepper leaned over to look at what the pair was working on, and she let out a soft gasp of surprise. In Morgan’s hands was a flower arrangement that looked exactly like the arc reactor she had set in the water of the lake 13 years ago. “I guess dinner can wait a few more minutes.”

**Author's Note:**

> I can't articulate right now but:  
> I love you 3000 is a symbol of Morgan's growth, and family and love, all within the movie. It hurts so much to think that that's where it stops for Tony, because in all honesty if she did it before she would probably continue it in the future. (Like it wasn't exclusively a Tony thing, she did it for Pepper too, so of course she's going to move past 3000)  
> This is sort of like, can she lose that meaning and then gain it back, can she use it to build a relationship with a father who can't be there? Ideally, yes.


End file.
